Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Resurrection and “Skyfall”

The Clockwork Pastor

Resurrection and “Skyfall”

My partner and I love James Bond movies, so of course we went to see the latest film in the franchise, Skyfall, on opening night. I tend to think it’s going to be one of the better of the Bond flicks and I’ve enjoyed the direction Bond has taken since Daniel Craig took the role in 2006.

I came accross a blog post that talks a little about the theme of resurrection in the movie and how it was so different from that Other resurrection:

If Jesus’ resurrection was both an assurance of his triumph over death and an ushering in of a new movement of shalom, that’s completely countercultural to a pop-art understanding of what it means to have new life after death. The latest James Bond film,Skyfall, is a stark reminder of this. When figures come back from the dead in our contemporary stories, they generally do so to kick butt.

In Skyfall, this is true of both the villain and the hero. At the start of the film, James Bond (Daniel Craig) engages in one of the bravura opening action sequences for which the franchise has become known. A motorcycle chase across rooftops leads to a foot chase atop a speeding train. Perhaps knowing that we’ve seen such exploits before, director Sam Mendes then has Bond commandeer a construction digger that’s being transported on the train and direct the bucket toward the bad guy. It’s a giddy, over-the-top touch that, like much of Skyfall, nods to the franchise’s lighter days.

The chase doesn’t end well for our hero, however. Without giving too much away, I’ll only say that the opening-credits sequence that follows this chase employs a resurrection motif (this being Bond, silhouettes of girls and guns are also part of the striking visual design). Skyfall is set up, then, as the tale of a man arising after being left for dead. (Asked later if he has a hobby, Bond answers: “Resurrection.”) When our hero makes his inevitable reappearance, what is his goal? To find out who was responsible for his (near) killing and bring them to violent justice.